is economical with his words. It's not often that the ATLien raps or even grants an interview, and when he does, die-hards hang onto every syllable, even if they sometimes misconstrue his sentiment. In a new interview with Fader magazine, 3 Stacks sets the record straight and denies the persistent rumors of an Outkast breakup.

"So I think when I hear things on the Internet that Outkast is over, I think, that's a shame. Because I don't have the power to stop Outkast, you know? I didn't start Outkast by myself. I don't have the power to stop Outkast," Andre said in the interview, which can be found on Fader's website.

Andre and bandmate Big Boi dropped their debut LP, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik, back in 1994, and they have since become an iconic act in hip-hop and music as a whole. In 2000 they dropped their fourth album, Stankonia, which they followed three years later with the double disc Speakerboxxx/ The Love Below. Though packaged as an Outkast album, each disc served as solo expression for the two MCs: Big Boi commandeered the Speakerboxxx portion and 3000 helmed The Love Below disc. In 2006, they released the "Idlewild" soundtrack together, but despite the constant rumors, there has been no group project since. There may never be another 'Kast album, 3 Stacks says.

"We're not on the roster or on a schedule with a label to put out an Outkast album. I can't say if or when we will, but I'm going to be in Outkast forever in some kind of way," he said.

There is an Andre solo LP on the horizon, but of course there is no date. "I'm at a place now where my deadline is my own self. I'm looking at it like, OK, I don't want to be like 40 years old and to haven't done this album," Dre said. "And I don't have a sense of time. When people say, Man, we haven't heard from you in like five years, or seen you, to me, it feels like a year. I don't have a good sense of time, but I do know I'm not a spring chicken anymore."